31.3.07

I have been reading about the German film Die grosse Stille since its release in 2005, mostly because it has won all sorts of European film festival awards. In 1984, director Philip Groening made an official request to the Carthusian monks of the legendary monastery of La Grande Chartreuse, to film a documentary about monastic life there. Since the pace of modern life does not mean much within a cloister, the monks considered the request and ultimately gave their approval -- 16 years later. My friends who live near Grenoble took me to visit La Grande Chartreuse, but you are allowed to visit only the museum, housed in the old monastic buildings, where you can learn about the process of making the Chartreuse liqueur but not actually enter the cloister.

As someone with great admiration for the monastic life (I count myself very lucky to teach music and art history in a school run by a Benedictine abbey), I have been longing to see the movie ever since. It opened on Friday for a brief run at the E Street Cinema, and my favorite Washington Post film reviewer, Desson Thomson, published a lengthy article about it (The Silent Treatment, March 30) in Friday's paper. I have been reading Desson Thomson's reviews since very shortly after I moved to Washington, and I can think of very few movies of which he approved that I have not subsequently liked. Even so, a movie about monastic life, I feared, may not appeal to just anyone. I should never have worried, because Thomson's review expressed perfectly what this movie will likely mean to me:

At first, the silence feels imposing -- practically deafening -- as we watch the documentary "Into Great Silence" and the monks of the Grand Chartreuse monastery praying, reading the Bible or simply sitting in quiet contemplation. But as we become acclimated to this muted atmosphere (we have plenty of time, as the film is nearly three hours long), something extraordinary happens: Our senses sharpen. The whispering of snow outside, the occasional clearing of a throat and -- sweet mercy! -- the clanging of a bell that summons these befrocked Carthusians to prayer reach our ears with a resounding purity. We may not experience their inner glories, but when we hear the monks' Gregorian chants, it's as though we have slipped from our seats into the back pews of Chartreuse.

All movies are about transformation, in a sense, as we focus -- almost reverently -- on the glowing screen before us. But we are accustomed to our emotions being marshaled along with music, snappy editing, special effects. "Into Great Silence" subjects us, instead, to a sort of sensory deprivation -- echoing the ascetic lifestyle of these monks, who are bound to a life of near-silent contemplation aside from weekly conversational breaks. [...] By luring us into their hushed world, filmmaker Philip Groening -- who produced, directed, shot and edited the movie -- subtly provokes us into an active state of observation. We experience the rituals of these men's lives, our heads craned forward and our breath held so we don't disturb their devotions. And as we vicariously participate in their daily rituals, we find ourselves, quite literally, at the ground level of spiritual worship. It's hard to recall a similar documentary that brings viewers so palpably close to that sacred experience. Even such religiously themed commercial successes as "The Passion of the Christ" and "The Chronicles of Narnia," which moved their audiences with special-effects technology and star power, seem brassy and superfluous by comparison.

The entire review merits your attention. My own review will follow shortly, as soon as I have found the opportunity to see the movie for myself.

30.3.07

Prelude

In bringing the rarely performed Richard Strauss opera Die Ägyptische Helena (“The Egyptian Helen”—last at the MET in 1928) back to the stage, the Metropolitan Opera is doing opera lovers a great favor. The music of this opera is marvelous, as most of even neglected Strauss is, and the opera’s story/libretto, maligned for being silly, incoherent, and whatever other damning thing one can throw at it, might just be worth our time, too. Nine years ago, Bernhard Holland wrote in the New York Times that “Richard Strauss gave Die Ägyptische Helena so many reasons to fail that its best qualities are neutralized, held hostage by its worst instincts. … [T]here exists so much in the opera’s favor, yet so much that almost guarantees its doom.” That was by way of introducing concert performances of the American Symphony Orchestra under Leon Botstein with—then as now—Deborah Voigt as Helena at Avery Fisher Hall that were widely considered a success, in part because they were not staged.

From the same venue and team, but five years later, comes the finest available recording of the opera. (By my count there are five performances on record—in various editions—only the 1970 RCA live recording from Vienna with Josef Krips, Edita Gruberova, Jess Thomas, Gwyneth Jones, and Peter Schreier is a serious alternative; Dorati / Detroit with Jones and Hendricks on Decca is oop.) The rest of the cast featured on that Telarc live recording, if more or less anonymous in late 2002, has all made their name in opera, since. Celena Shafer surely impressed everyone who heard her in the Washington Concert Opera’s performance of Massenet’s Esclarmonde two years ago. Carl Tanner—he’s been Samson for the WNO—has established himself firmly on the world’s opera stages (no more truck-driving and head-hunting for him…), Eric Cutler has since issued his debut recital on EMI, Jill Grove is in very good company as an ARIA winner (including Ms. Shafer and Mr. Cutler).

But about that story: Poseidon’s mistress Aithra awaits her sea-ruling lover for dinner – in vain. (Poseidon is currently in Ethiopia.) Her omniscient clam (or mussel, although “mussel” and the German “Muschel” are not the same; the latter refers to the entire phylum of Mollusca, not just the class of Bivalvia) tells of a ship where a beautiful woman (the most beautiful woman, in fact) is about to be murdered by her jealous husband.

Aithra is appalled and prevents the murder by having the sea wreck the ship and the couple washed ashore. She receives Helen (just back from a ten-year stint with Paris in Troy) and her Spartan husband Menelas (just back from an equally long stint of destroying Troy and Paris) in her abode and sets about to fix that troubled marriage for Helen’s sake. The latter still loves Menelas, even if Aithra can’t understand what the woman finds in the aggressive boor.

Potions calm Menelas down—but he is haunted by visions of his less-than-ideally faithful wife (Menelas didn’t know Leonard Cohen, but he would have sympathetically hummed along to: “Everybody knows that you love me baby / Everybody knows that you really do / Everybody knows that you’ve been faithful / give or take a night or two * / Everybody knows you’ve been discreet / But there were so many people you just had to meet / Without your clothes / And everybody knows”) and promptly runs amok. Aithra’s fairies distract him and, confused, Menelas thinks he is killing Paris and Helen all over again as he stabs at the conjured spirits. (* Or 3652, as it were)

Now Aithra tells him that Helen was never actually in Troy—but that a spirit had been created in her image to protect the real Helen who was sound asleep all that time, safely tucked away in Egypt. (This is actually one of the variations of the myth, but with Hofmannsthal and Strauss it’s just that: a cockamamy scheme to help Menelas reconcile Helen’s true love for him with her alleged (actual, but now appearing never-to-have-happened) marital transgressions. (After Paris’ death she was handed from brother to brother… “A sister-in-law unlike any other” Menelas points out, with sarcastic disdain.)

That seems to be the solution at first, and Helen asks to be ferried (fairied, to be precise) away to a secluded place where she can sort things out with her hubby. Soon she realizes that Menelas’ forgetting the past (supported by more potions) does not actually help. Now the quarrels are just different—and the newly reunited couple finds itself in a union that is not really themselves. A foreign prince and his rash son (Altair and Da-ud) crash the party, create diversion, but don’t propel the drama. Helen decides that in order to save her real marriage she must risk having Menelas remember everything—and gives him a potion to that effect. With that act she also allows Menelas to come to the difficult terms of how his beautiful loving wife could be the same one that ran away with Paris, leaving him with their daughter behind and causing a long, bloody war. In overcoming this discrepancy, an actual reunion is possible and the opera ends on this hopeful, but unresolved, and hardly definitively happy, note—not unlike Così, Der Rosenkavalier, or Capriccio.

If this (and numerous fairies and acts of magic and some summoned sea-warriors of Poseidon) sounds ludicrously “out there”, it’s probably because the surface of the story can all too easily detract from its substance. At the heart of Die Ägyptische Helena is a (nearly) as domestic a story as in Intermezzo (another obscure opera of his—see table to the left) or, non-operatically, in the Sinfonia Domestica.

Meaning

It’s a beautiful and sensitive problem and predicament that Strauss and Hofmannsthal tackle: That of the difficulties of reconciling the seeming inconsistencies and contradictions of reality (in spouses or elsewhere); the reality of the people we interact with and the ideal we may hold of them. Often we simply deny this discrepancy; others react with violent outbursts to them. (A rather crass label for this conflict is the “Virgin Mary / Whore complex”.) Anyone who has ever been in a relationship will have done or thought something they know is better not shared with the respective partner. (“Your thighs are fat”, “That guy is really hot”, “I wish your mother finally died”, “No, actually the soup is execrable”, “You’re not the best I’ve had” etc.)

At the same time we run around denying our partners might think similar thoughts or do similar deeds. When we can’t brush that inconsistency under the carpet anymore, we might be in trouble, just like Menelas, who can’t deny that half the Trojan royal family had a go at Helen. (What kind of a role model would she be to our daughter, he thinks.) Understandably it takes him a while to integrate that person with the Helen he loves and knows and who loves him… and then accept her as that, in all her complexities.

Even if you don’t buy that the glaring discrepancy between the two acts of Strauss’ opera—the comedic, silly first act and the relatively serious drama of the second act—represent in form the very psychological discrepancies the characters have to overcome, the subject matter alone deserves more benevolent attention than the easy mockery that it usually meets. Sure, it’s easy to claim silliness starts with the first line, “Dinner is served” in the MET-titles (it’s actually “The meal is prepared” or “The feast awaits… night is falling”), but that is in any case no less meaningful a way to start an opera than using the lines: “Five… Ten… Twenty… Thirty… Thirty-six… Forty-three”—and amounts to little more than taking potshots at poor Helena. Most of the absurdity in it merely serves to illustrate this very human, very bourgeois and near-universal condition.

Staging

If taken as the silly, hopelessly weird opera that it is generally thought of, a new production might well be tempted to go all-out absurd and completely ignore or obscure the central theme. David Fielding, who updated his 1997 staging from the Garsington Festival for the MET, does not fall victim to that temptation. His set is wild, abstract, and a good many of those things that have MET patrons cringe, but it never distracts, often adds subtly to the drama (while looking unsubtle on the outside—not unlike the opera itself). Acts I and II are visual inversions of each other—what is white in act I is black in act II, what was stage left in act one is now stage right. The sets are gorgeous, skewed and abstract contraptions of oversized doors and walls. A number of inspired touches makes this opera a visually most arresting feast for the eyes of those that don’t expect traditional settings. But why would anyone care about representational sets when the story of the opera has so little to do with the actual drama, anyway? The direction of the green fairy-chorus (a weird alienesque bunch of glittering things, somewhere between lions and Liszt-monkeys, in mint-mouthwash colored vinyl dresses) is delightful and surprisingly in line with the text. (When they can’t take the radiance of Helen’s beauty, why shouldn’t they take out their glacier-goggles?)

The Music

Helen might be Clytemnestra’s sister (both hatched from eggs after Zeus raped/seduced their mother with at least one of them having been in the form of a swan… the accounts vary on this)—but Strauss’ 1928 opera sounds much more like Salome than Elektra, shot through with the harmonic and orchestral language we might know from later works like Die Frau ohne Schatten (1919) and Arabella (1933). The music is gorgeous far beyond what one might expect for an opera of such ill repute (even if, admittedly, no one ever claimed that it was neglected because of the music). Hugo von Hofmannsthal, who wrote the libretto for Helene (as he did for Elektra, Der Rosenkavalier, Ariadne auf Naxos, Die Frau ohne Schatten, Arabella, and Die Liebe der Danaë) wanted Strauss to get away from Wagnerian “erotic screaming” (Frau ohne Schatten, anyone?), and while that goal was achieved, there are still a couple of orchestral moments in Helene that bring Die Walküre and Das Rheingold to mind. This is music to indulge in and it gives the two leading sopranos more wonderful opportunities to show off their ability (athletic and bel canto, alike), sensitivity, and vocal voluptuousness than other composers manage to offer in their entire œvre’s output.

The Singing

The Met cast offers several reasons to tune in on Saturday, but none greater than the spectacular Diana Damrau and Deborah Voigt. The latter sang more than admirably despite having been announced “ill” by Peter Gelb. A speckle on the very first note and slight metallic restriction that loosened as the opera went on were the only notable results of that illness in the first act. An odd, but isolated, metallic buzzing (like a blown tweeter) when she was at her most forceful in the “Zweite Brautnacht, Zaubernacht” opening of act II was the only other moment when her incapacitation called attention to itself. Her Helen was still a vocal feat and feast, and to hear her—hopefully—in full health on Saturday (1.30 PM) should prove even more rewarding. Sadly not visible on the radio, she now even believably looks the part of “most beautiful woman in the world”!

Her Helen was bettered only by Aithra with her more agile part—brought to life in every way by the German soprano Diana Damrau. With diction as perfect as her natural pronunciation, she also added a theatrical element to her use of language. An actor could not have treated language more appropriately than she. And while this might be a detail lost on all but those who follow the libretto by listening to it, her vocal contribution escaped no one in the house, which went (comparatively) wild at curtain call. Indeed, Ms. Damrau must have momentarily forgotten that she was not the top-billed singer and last to take a bow, because she started to order her colleagues together for the group-bow before realizing that Ms. Voigt and Torsten Kerl (Menelas) had yet to appear. A very cute (and on that night truly forgivable) faux pas.

Under Fielding’s direction, said Torsten Kerl came across like Alec Baldwin in one of his slightly absurd, over the top performances. He lacked the power to compete with the ladies, seemed at his limit throughout the first act (never strained but never easily cutting across the orchestra, either) – but came to life mid-second act. Jill Grove repeated her clam/mussel from the 2002 performance and recording with maturity and a deep, molluscan beauty. Wolfgang Brendel brought his veteran but unreliable baritone to the part of prince Altair and surprised with a big and round, largely wobble-free delivery that belied recent experiences I have had with him.

Altair’s son, Da-ud, was sung by Texan tenor Garrett Sorenson and it was never in question why he had previously been given seven other roles at the MET. He’ll get more, still, judging by what he made of this small part. The chorus was fine – but acted even better. Only the Met orchestra under Fabio Luisi (who so had magnificently conducted Simon Boccanegra) left something to be desired. Best when sweeping and impetuous, there were some problems in the delicate (and already oddly tuned) string passage accompanying Aithra’s “Ihr grünen Augen” and the ensemble seemed to drift apart a little in the first act.

Saturday at 1.30PM, WETA will broadcast Die Ägyptische Helena. Tune in, because - apart from being the only chance to hear vocal music on WETA - it's a truly wonderful Opera that does not deserve the neglect it has long suffered.

The Met cast offers several reasons to tune in on Saturday, but none greater than the spectacular Diana Damrau and Deborah Voigt. The latter sang more than admirably despite having been announced “ill” by Peter Gelb. A speckle on the very first note and slight metallic restriction that loosened as the opera went on were the only notable results of that illness in the first act. An odd, but isolated, metallic buzzing (like a blown tweeter) when she was at her most forceful in the “Zweite Brautnacht, Zaubernacht” opening of act II was the only other moment when her ‘incapacitation’ called attention to itself. Her Helen was still a vocal feat and feast, and to hear her – hopefully – in full health on Saturday (1.30PM) should prove even more rewarding. Sadly not visible on the radio, she now even believably looks the part of "most beautiful woman in the world"!

Her Helen was bettered only by Aithra with her more agile part – brought to life in every way by the German soprano Diana Damrau. With diction as perfect as her natural pronunciation, she also added a theatrical element to her use of language. An actor could not have treated language more appropriately than she. And while this might be a detail lost on all but those who follow the libretto by listening to it, her vocal contribution escaped no one in the house which went (comparatively) wild at curtain call. (Indeed, Ms. Damrau must have momentarily forgotten that she was not the top-billed singer and last to take a bow, because she started to order her colleagues together for the group-bow before realizing that Ms. Voigt and Torsten Kerl (Menelas) had yet to appear. A very cute (and on that night truly forgivable) faux pas.

Read our complete review and general discussion of this opera here. Charles collection of reviews of Helena can be read here.

James Judd is most gladly seen in the area and the more of him I see, the more I like him. There is something – hard to define – about him that just makes you want to hear him again and again. There’s nothing either fancy or flashy about the Music Director of the NZSO. Instead, there is something ‘fine’, generous in the way he elicits music from the BSO.

Last – Thursday – night, at Strathmore, he presented an “Explorer Series” concert with that orchestra. This last of a series of three such concerts dealt with symmetry in music. “Symmetry and the Golden Rule” were supposed to be explored around Bach’s, Schoenberg’s, and Mozart’s music. If it did not quite work out that way, it certainly was not the orchestra that was at fault here.

The Bach was rumbling, warmhearted, genial – played in a way you don’t much hear anymore these days. Apart from individual trumpet squeaks, the BSO brass was a pleasure to hear in Bach. (After all, you hardly hear Bach by non-period groups these days, and their brass is often not good.) Music lover and astrophysicist Doctor Mario Livio then took over to talk.

His presentation was reasonably short and entertaining, but sadly lacking in substance. He repeated – word for word – his short talk from last year’s season announcement: A bit more was needed. That Bach worked with symmetry and numbers we now know – but how did he do it… and how did Schoenberg? The swirly-swirl of static fractals and nature’s patterns did nothing to enhance Verklärte Nacht.

It so distracted from the music that it came to the point of sabotaging the performance. How it illustrated anything at all about this music I have not quite figured out yet. Why was I looking at bark for five minutes – only to be torn away again by these patterns? Schoenberg’s monumentally beautiful work deserves – nay: needs all the attention that it can get.

“Power Point is thy enemy” – Mr. Livio presents very well, but the format was flawed. Mozart was enjoyable on its own, though, and not interrupted with projections above it. Symphony No.40 was meaty (no harm) and enjoyable with a certain eagerness. Although it contained a few sloppy moments, they were of the amiable kind, not maddening. A night of wonderful music well played, even if the concert’s raison d’etre misfired.

So you noticed the symmetry?

--

Michael Lodico's review of the same concert can be read here. This program will repeat tonight and tomorrow evening (March 30 and 31, 8 pm) and Sunday afternoon (April 1, 3 pm) at Meyerhoff Symphony Hall.

In a week that has seen or will see new productions of Die Walküre and La Fille du Régiment at Washington National Opera and a Cavalleria Rusticana / I Pagliacci (review this weekend) coming to Fairfax from Virginia Opera, only a crazy person would also go to hear the latest production at Baltimore Opera, too. Well, I admit that I have a weakness for Czech opera, and Bedřich Smetana's Prodaná Nevěsta (The Bartered Bride) is a guilty pleasure worth a trip to Charm City (especially since the only time that the opera was mounted by WNO was in 1994). True, it may be described -- viciously -- as just a step or two above musical theater, but the music and story are light, airy fun, the perfect amuse-gueule before the tragic main course awaiting us next month in Janáček's Jenůfa from Washington National Opera.

Bedřich Smetana (1824-1884)

Created in Prague in 1866 and significantly revised over the following four years, the story of Bartered Bride (libretto by Karel Sabina) is set in a quirky little village in Bohemia. The worst thing that can happen here is that a young girl named Mařenka may not be able to marry the man she loves, Jeník, because her father has signed a contract arranging her marriage to Vašek. Even that misfortune is ultimately avoided, amid much drinking of beer, folk dancing, and a delightful circus. This jolly town is diametrically opposed to what would be its evil sister city, the hateful, claustrophobic Borough of Britten's Peter Grimes. In both villages, everyone knows everyone's business, but the difference is in what they do with that information.

In James McNamara's production for the first-ever performance of this work by Baltimore Opera, the plain, even drab sets (by Rheinhard Heinrich) consist of a wall and houses that expand or contract into the generally barren stage. The entire village is made of the same bland stone, covered with what look like either dead vines or the shadows of unseen trees. The only dash of color in the staging is during the slapstick Act III circus scene, complete with onstage banda, colored lights, flashy costumes, and a dog leaping through hoops. In a clever move, it is also the only time that the Czech language is supplanted by English (and likewise English by Czech in the supertitles, to comic effect), with the Texan twang of the ringmaster (Luke Grooms) and the Baltimore accent ("hon") of the Indian chief (Patrick Toomey). Here is an opera with an actual circus, instead of an opera transformed into a circus, like the American Opera Theater's Acis and Galatea earlier this year.

The singing was good, not least because of the presence of two genuine Czech singers from the roster of the Prague National Theater in the lead roles. Dana Burešová was a playful Mařenka, with slight intonation issues, especially in her low range. Her scene with Vašek, sung by the fine character tenor Doug Jones (almost stealing the show), was particularly well acted. Tenor Valentin Prolat was a little stiff as Jeník, with a dark, thick sound where he needed it but little dramatic or musical subtlety. Bass Gregory Frank was a well-sung caricature as the conniving marriage broker Kecal.

The best contribution from Prague was the National Theater's music director, Oliver von Dohnányi, who drove his orchestra and cast through a pleasingly animated performance, almost always keeping them together. The famous overture, with its restless contrapuntal main theme, was at the edge of too fast for the orchestra, who played heroically. The choral scenes had a full and happy sound, especially the famous Beer chorus ("Beer is a gift from heaven" -- yes, indeed!), although the choreography was stilted and unimaginative. Dancers attempted to enliven those scenes, with mixed success, although the music from the orchestra was always pleasing.

Two performances of The Bartered Bride remain, tonight (March 30, 8:15 pm) and Sunday afternoon (April 1, 3 pm), in the Lyric Opera House in Baltimore. Also, Bartered Bride was the first opera to be made into a film (rather than simply filmed on stage), Die Verkaufte Braut, directed by Max Ophüls in 1932, with Jarmila Novotna in the title role.

Last night at Strathmore, Dr. Mario Livio, senior astrophysicist at the Hubble Space Telescope Science Institute and author of the book The Golden Ratio, joined the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra to introduce the performance of the Schönberg tone poem Verklärte Nacht and Mozart's Symphony No. 40. Livio offered the audience concise commentaries on each piece, aided by a massive projection screen over the orchestra with slides to reinforce his talk. Livio led the audience to ponder why something should be considered more beautiful than something else: his answer was symmetry. In particular, our evolutionarily developed sense of fear and attraction, such as the threat in the symmetric face of a lion, or the attraction of the perfect tail of a genetically superior peacock.

Livio then asked the audience to contemplate the aspects of hope and despair found in the Dehmel poem that inspired Verklärte Nacht, the racy poem about a young couple walking in moonlight. The background of the poem, more or less, is that the woman tells the man that she is carrying another man's child. After struggling with this news, the man accepts the child as his own, after which the couple shares an intimate moment. (See Janet Bedell's program notes for more information.) The orchestra then played a brief passage involving turmoil lacking musical symmetry; and later a highly symmetric passage portraying hope.

Now brilliantly adding a visual dimension to the music, Livio, along with Zoltan Levay, compiled a progression of fractals – self-similar geometric constructions like this – that changed along with the form, modulations, and level of symmetry in Schönberg’s early tonal masterpiece. After about ten to fifteen minutes to get used to the format, an awareness of the different intensities of fractals developed. By the last chord of the tone poem, the sound of blissful hope and an image of symmetrical perfection gradually faded out together at the same time. Impressively well planned, this format engaged the audience so that they felt it was their responsibility to listen actively.

Guest conductor, James Judd, also led the orchestra in the Orchestral Suite No. 3 of Bach and the Symphony No. 40 of Mozart. Though a demanding conductor, Judd for the most part constantly pushed the orchestra in terms of tempo and perpetual loudness, which led to ensemble issues that are not the fault of the Baltimore Symphony. The exception to this trend was in the Minuetto: Allegretto of the Mozart Symphony, which was conducted in a stately, slow 1. The wind sections in the final Allegro assai movement were lovely.

29.3.07

Ionarts is on record for thinking that WETA's decision to abandon classical music was, how to put this politely, a mistake. No one was happier than we when the station decided to take advantage of the format change at WGMS to return to classical programming. The need of many people for classical music on the radio -- without commercials -- can be illustrated with a personal example. I teach in a school run by a Benedictine monastery, and the monks complained to me regularly about what had happened to their classical music station. Many of the monks listen to the radio regularly during their contemplative time, while reading and studying. Yes, they could play CDs, but radio programming is so much better suited for this purpose because it requires no conscious thought beyond turning on the radio. When classical music returned to WETA's airwaves, there were some very happy monks in the abbey.

When the format change was announced, I offered a starry-eyed, pie-in-the-sky list of suggested programming. Almost none of it features in the playlist yet, but things cannot turn around immediately. However, take as an example what I heard on WBJC last night during the car trip back home from hearing Smetana's The Bartered Bride at Baltimore Opera (review planned for tomorrow). The first half of the hour was as follows (with information taken from the evening's playlist published online):

Ludwig van Beethoven, Fidelio Overture, op. 72, played by the Bamberg Symphony under the baton of Eugen Jochum (RCA/BMG 61212)--a pretty standard work that could be found regularly on either station

The commentator, Reed Hessler, then linked the style of Beethoven with one of his sources of inspiration, the strongly contrasted and emotionally charged music of Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach, by playing Mikhail Pletnev's excellent 2001 recording of the fourth CPE Bach sonata, WQ 52 (DG/Archiv 459614)

The hour was rounded off with Elgar's Dream Children, op. 43 (Teldec 92374), with Andrew Davis leading the BBC Symphony Orchestra

That exceptionally fine sequence of music, a mixture of the mainstream with music farther off the beaten path, led into the regular Wednesday night program Live at the Concertgebouw (11 pm to 1 am), hosted by Hans Haffmans, the next best thing to living in Amsterdam. The broadcasts feature the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, of course, but some weeks you will hear Collegium Vocale Gent, the Radio Filharmonisch Orkest Holland, the Orchestra of the 18th Century, the Rotterdam Philharmonic, the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, and many other visiting orchestras and chamber ensembles. Last night's concert was recorded in 2003 (I think), with Neeme Jarvi conducting the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra. The program opened with Liadov's tone poem The Enchanted Lake, op. 62, followed by Alphonus Diepenbrock's Hymne an die Nacht (1899), with soprano Linda Mabbs. The second half was a complete performance of Rachmaninoff's second symphony.

If you are in Washington and looking for some liturgies to attend during Holy Week, with historical music, you should consider the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception (4th Street and Michigan Avenue NE), a short walk from the Brookland/CUA Metro stop (Red Line). The professional chamber choir, of which I am a member, will be performing the following repertoire during the high liturgies.

We've been on a Juan Diego Flórez kick recently, at least since reviewing the recording he made of Rossini's Matilde di Shabran. This DVD of Donizetti's La Fille du Régiment is the latest Flórez to cross my desk, and its release has been timed to coincide with the tenor's triumphant appearances in this opera around the world. In January, it was Flórez with Natalie Dessay in a new Covent Garden production of the opera directed by Laurent Pelly, which Tim Ashley called in his review for The Guardian "a truly outstanding night at Covent Garden, the like of which we haven't seen in ages." In The Independent, Edward Seckerson said it was "one of the happiest nights the Royal Opera has fielded since I don't know when." (See many other reviews here.)

Then Flórez sang the role at La Scala and, as covered by Opera Chic in Milan, gave the first encore during a staged opera since Toscanini banned the practice for reasons of dramatic continuity. (Opera Chic even has sound files.) In an interview with Patrick Cole for Bloomberg News, Flórez recalls that evening: "So after the aria, the applause was very, very long, and people were shouting 'bis, bis', just as I had expected and they didn't stop. So I did the encore. The next day, I saw in the newspapers that no one had made an encore since 1933. I didn't know that!"

Juan Diego Flórez, Ah! mes amis (Genoa, 2005)

Before either of those performances there was this production at the Teatro Carlo Felice in Genoa, created by Emilio Sagi for the Teatro Comunale di Bologna. It was recorded live in 2005 and released this past fall. The performance is most valuable for capturing Flórez at his best in this role. The most famous aria, Ah! mes amis in Act I, has those nine infamous high C's just about as perfect as they could be, all lined up and pure. The crowd went wild, shouting "Bis, bis," and Flórez sang the second part of the aria (Pour mon âme) a second time, just as flawlessly. If that is not enough, he also sings an excellent high D in the Act II romance Pour me rapprocher de Marie. It is a stellar performance, which he has been recreating in other theaters.

Juan Diego Flórez, Encore (!) of Pour mon âme (Genoa, 2005)

The rest of the cast is also fine. Soprano Patrizia Ciofi gives very good renditions of Marie's regimental song and Il faut partir, the beautiful aria at the end of Act I. Ciofi's contribution to the Act II comic trio Le jour naissait dans le bocage is hilarious, too, as she sings so horribly out of tune (Marie chafes at being civilized in the Marquise's home) that it's just ghastly. The video relies too heavily on closeups, which does none of the singers any favors: Flórez with his cheesy mustache and especially Ciofi with her bizarre grimaces and crooked smile. Nicola Ulivieri and Francesca Franci are also good as Sulpice and La Marquise de Berkenfield, respectively.

The production, which updates the action from the Napoleonic Wars to the liberation of France by the American Army at the end of World War II, does not make much sense but does not detract from one's enjoyment. I am screening it right now for one of my classes, whom I will chaperone to the dress rehearsal of this opera on Thursday night. The production has required some explaining, but not too much. In a supplemental disc, which the class will likely also enjoy, Patrizia Ciofi narrates her role, and we see footage of the rehearsals, often seamlessly joined to the same scene in the DVD.

Decca B0007620-09

Juan Diego Flórez sang in The Barber of Seville at the Met this month (I heard it via Sirius) -- Lawrence Brownlee will replace him in the April/May performances. Americans will have to wait until next season, when Dessay and Flórez are scheduled to sing La Fille du Régiment again, at the Met in April 2008.

Washington National Opera has decided to mount La Fille du Régiment this season, in the production shown in this DVD (although the packaging, showing two actors in Napoleonic costumes, has not indicated that) and with the same conductor, Riccardo Frizza. It will be without Flórez, however, who last appeared in Washington in L'Italiana in Algeri last season. WNO has mounted Fille twice before, in 1986 and 1993, and the original idea may have been to bring this production to Washington with Flórez. Flórez will be singing Tonio this month, but at the Vienna Staatsoper (opening on March 31, the same as Washington's opening night, through April 28). It looks like Vienna won out. If Flórez were in the WNO cast, one can be sure that all, or at least some, of the performances would be sold out, which is not the case right now.

Next month will be the third year for Take a Friend to the Orchestra Month, a yearly celebration inaugurated by blogger Drew McManus at Adaptistration. The idea is that average people throughout the country invite friends who don't regularly participate in live classical music events to attend a performance. If you want to take part, let Drew know: he usually mentions some of the experiences people have.

Here is a list of appropriate concerts in the Washington and Baltimore area during the month of April. The Ionarts staff has marked our recommendations for what we think the most satisfying events will be:

*"Young conductor and pianist mean reduced ticket prices ($20 and $30), and interesting selections by Copland and Schubert, with the Ravel piano concerto"

Continue reading this article.OTHER ORCHESTRASApril 1 (Sun, 4 pm)J. S. Bach, St. John PassionWashington National Cathedral Combined Choirs and Baroque OrchestraWashington National Cathedral**"Top of the line... but too long, too choral, and too monotonous (I can't believe I have to say that...) for the neophyte"

April 28 (Sat, 8 pm)National Philharmonic with Soovin Kim (violin)Music Center at Strathmore**"A pleasing program for the neophyte, including Rossini's Barber of Seville overture, Mendelssohn's violin concerto, and Beethoven's Pastoral Symphony. Kids of ages 7 to 17 get a free ticket when with an adult paying full price, too."

April 15 (Sun, 3 pm)Concertante[FREE]National Academy of Sciences (2100 C Street NW)**"This is really a chamber music concert, but with a larger group, it squeaks by for consideration: Richard Strauss’s Capriccio Suite, Arnold Schoenberg’s Transfigured Night, and Johannes Brahms’ String Sextet. Excellent programming, too -- introduction to music would be necessary, so go with a friend who can explain what to look for!"

April 22 (Sun, 5 pm)Inscape Chamber OrchestraEpiscopal Church of the Redeemer (Bethesda, Md.)**"The program is called Vienna Redux, and the music by Debussy, Mahler, Schoenberg, Strauss may be a bit much for a true newcomer. If you think your guest has what it takes, this should be good."

April 24 (Tue, 8 pm)Fessenden EnsembleMusic by Bartók, ElgarSt. Columba's Episcopal Church*"Bartók, although much loved at Ionarts, is almost guaranteed to turn off an untrained ear"

April 29 (Sun, 6:30 pm)Academy of Ancient Music [FREE]Music by J. S. Bach, Handel, and TelemannNational Gallery of Art**"Catch this group on its latest U.S. tour. Now under the direction of harpsichordist Richard Egarr. Not to be missed, but watch out for the harpsichord. Believe it or not... virgin ears don't like it much!"

This week I have had the chance to see two propaganda concerts in the span of three days – which, as an eager proponent of more cultural diplomacy (which is the name for propaganda if ‘your guys’ are doing it), I embrace wholeheartedly. In principle, at least.

Ideally, cultural diplomacy brings people of diverse background, opinions, and cultures together on presumably neutral, common ground. Art – classical music – for example.

The United States was no slouch at this during the Cold War. Duke Ellington, Van Cliburn, and Co. were out there to convince peoples around the world that the US was not a ruthless, soulless capitalist, slave-holding, baby-eating monster. Well, at least not only that. Since then, the US seems to have forgotten the benefits of this policy that cost a comparatively paltry $1 billion annually – especially when compared to certain policies that cost up to $200 million per day and have done significantly less to improve the image of the United States abroad.

No Nation had perfected the art of cultural diplomacy quite as the Soviet Union. In late 1989, the Afghan blood not yet dry on Russian bayonets, they sent the Red Army Choir to the Kennedy Center who, accompanied by standing ovations, left a tear-soaked audience behind. They sang at the White House and on David Letterman – and the press suggested that Gorbachev might as well retire all his career diplomats, as long as these singers were around. Doing “God Bless America” as an encore, surreal as it might have been, was a touch of genius.

It is safe to assume that the successor-state to the Soviet Union – Russia – is not lacking much in this skill, either. And, indeed, after having dropped the ball for a few years after the fall of the Soviet Empire, Russia now puts some of its new riches toward cultural diplomacy, again. Its ballet companies tour the world’s capitals (currency having been the primary reason once, but losing more and more of its importance), its orchestras the world. At the heart of this mission is the National Philharmonic Orchestra of Russia (NPOR), an orchestra stamped out of the ground by Vladimir Putin for Vladimir Spivakov (close to former Culture Minister Mikhail Shvydkoi, violin teacher to Putin's kids, friend of the Putin family and of course ‘politically reliable’) after the Mikhail Pletnev-founded Russian National Orchestra (RNO) refused to lose its independence from the state to become the Russian National Philharmonic Orchestra (RNPO). (For more on the Moscow orchestra politics read George Loomis’ 2003 IHT article.) Its job is to spread the wonders of fine Russian culture (of which there are a great many, of course) and perhaps detract attention from Russia spiraling from a ‘totalitarian-light’ kleptocracy toward a 21st century variety of fascism.

The RNPO tours with some of the finest Russian soloists and takes a good crack at their mission. This time they brought Olga Kern to the Kennedy Center – and she may well have detracted successfully from energy extortion, journalist assassinations, Chechnya, et al... but unfortunately she also detracted from Rachmaninov, whose second Piano Concerto she played. Technically gifted and with some very fine recordings (Harmonia Mundi) under her (short) belt, this excessively beautiful blonde did nothing to further Rachmaninov’s cause among the connoisseurs in the audience. Her opening chords were very nicely organized around a steady crescendo, but there was no sense of portamento; the chords were plunked down separately (as is lamentably often the case) for effect, and then exaggerated with little extra delays. The slow movement was percussive and devoid of any legato, robbing “R2” of its integrity for the sake of a little hollow splash. The most interesting aspect of the final movement was the intricate muscle-work on her toned, exposed shoulders. The Piano – a Yamaha – sounded bearably bright in the upper register but seemed to ‘burp’ in the very lowest: not an advertisement for the craft of the Japanese makers.

The preceding Festival Overture op.96 by Dmitry Shostakovich is, fittingly, a propaganda work written to commemorate the 37th anniversary of the Revolution (it was part of a deal for DSCH to re-ingratiate himself with the party). It’s one of my least favorite works by Shostakovich: A trite, pompous, never-altering 8-minute all-out fake orgasm that might impress at first, but is, at best, a musical Potemkin’s Village. DSCH’s infinitely superior propaganda work, the genuinely great Fifth Symphony was – not surprisingly – on the second half of this program... but by then these ears had had enough and moved on to hear Wagner next door. The NPOR plays well but far from great – with “Russian subtlety” as a friend put it mischievously. It does not hold a candle to Pletnev’s (unpolitical) RNO which, tellingly, made Beethoven the featured composer of 2006 (it was 'supposed' to be the Shostakovich's year).

North German Radio Symphony Orchestra

Hanseatic Propaganda at Carnegie Hall

The North German Broadcasting Company (NDR) had different goals for its North American (only New York, actually) outreach – perhaps less nefarious, if no less calculating. With their primary instrument, the North German Radio Symphony Orchestra (NDRSO), they are here to promote (raise visibility & funds) their new Private-Public-Partnership undertaking of building a new symphony hall in Hamburg... the imposing, but fittingly impressive “Elbe Philharmonic Hall”.

A glossy, oversized, lavishly illustrated catalogue accompanied their first (of two) Carnegie Hall concerts on Monday, March 27th, showing the plans for this Herzog & de Meuron (Tate Modern, London – de Young Museum, San Francisco – Olympic Stadium, Beijing) developed complex – and giving a history of the city, the NDR, and Music Director Christoph von Dohnányi. The building, sitting on the late 19th century, dark-red brick storage houses in the former industrial port district, looks like it is straight out of a futuristic version of The Lord of the Rings; a tower of light, a ship sailing some 115 feet above the ground.

Their program, true to their cause, was “all-Hamburgian”. That’s not too difficult if your native sons include Felix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy and Johannes Brahms and it’s even easier if you include – only natural for a city shaped by its traders and merchants – those who have made Hamburg a center of their work or life: Georg Philipp Telemann, C.P.E. Bach, Gustav Mahler, György Ligeti, Alfred Schnittke, Sofia Gubaidulina, et al..

Having originally scheduled my NDR experience for Tuesday, I fully expected the Mendelssohn Violin Concerto to be performed. A very fine performance, surely, under Vadim Repin, but still the same old, if ever-beautiful, concerto. What a delight and joy to be presented with the whacky, wild, and wondrous Forth Violin concerto by Alfred Schnittke, instead! The musical Gods seemed to have smiled upon me, even if many audience members more likely grid their teeth. They should not have, because this concerto, even if its fourth movement is probably a little too long for its own good, is music to smile about and laugh at... it’s entertainment in the best sense. It toys with beauty and the listeners’ expectations before it irreverently pulls the rug out from underneath them. It’s a creative and unique collage of styles; it is part serene, part surreal. There were moments where I fully expected soloist Repin to crack a smile mid-playing. Schnittke in general and this work in particular, is ill served by being taken too seriously. We don’t need an extra furrow in our brow as we might with the all-capital-letters “serious” music of Liszt or late Beethoven.

Bells toll the first movement in – whereupon the violin enters in faked harmony before it all goes to hell, crunching and cats wailing... tricking the listener and making him fear the worst before reemerging as sweet and lyrical. The second movement (Vivo) has a ridiculously frantic climax and lots of big-hearted cacophony with a broad smile; a far cry from the bone-dry, thin-lipped intellectual modernism of a Boulez or Ferneyhough. Who can refuse to love the harpsichord in the third movement where it supports one of the hauntingly beautiful melodies in the solo violin and strings before it slowly slips away to turn sour in a deliciously subversive – or coy – way. A bit quieter, perhaps even with serious moments, the fourth movement loses some of the edge, even as it winks at the listener, courtesy of the prepared piano.

The other highlight of the concert was a rich and saturated rendition of Brahms’ First Symphony. From the first timpani strokes onward, this was captivating playing. Cut from one cloth, and a luscious cloth, at that. Confident – just like Brahms must have labored hard on making it sound – with shimmering backdrops to serve the melodies and minimal thematic material. But even amid this generous sound there was at every point an attention to detail displayed that other orchestras might give in an opening or final chord, but few places else. With the focus audibly being on more than just getting the notes right and playing in unison (largely a given, with the NDRSO), this was enough to elicit rave ovations from most of the Carnegie audience. The Mendelssohn Ruy Blas Overture, op.95, had already shown that this orchestra is something to be proud of... an oiled machine with a lean, expressive, sinuous string section; a band that is technically so assured and in control that it automatically hones in on elements like detail, tone, feeling, color.

Today they will perform the aforementioned Mendelssohn Violin Concerto, Mahler's First Symphony, and Ligeti's Lontano. On Wednesday they will perform Beethoven's Eroica as part of the United Nation's 50th anniversary celebration of the 1957 Treaty of Rome.